[YS Exclusive] Agritech startup Superplum raises pre-Series A round of $3.8M from marquee investors

Noida-based agritech startup Superplum has closed a pre-Series A round of $3.8 million from a clutch of new and existing investors.

The startup said it has raised a total of $6.8 million since its inception in 2019, from investors including Steve Jurvetson of Future and former partner of Draper Fisher Jurvetson; Dan Rose of Coatue Ventures and earlier Facebook; Mark Siegel of Menlo Ventures (Uber); Kabir Misra of Softbank, RPS ventures; Curtis Macnguyen of Ivory Capital; Ron Snyder (Flextronics, Crocs, Codigo); and Binny Bansal of Flipkart.  

Superplum will use the fresh capital to build farm infrastructure, strengthen its management team, and expand its distribution network.

Shobhit Gupta, Founder and CEO, Superplum, said, "India is the world's second-largest agriculture market and we produce more than 110 million tons of fruits every year. However, we see broken supply chains, massive wastage gluts, and shortages both geographically and over time."

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"We plan to fix this broken channel with a low-cost, modern supply-chain solution that can ensure fresher and higher quality products across the country,” he added.

Superplum was started by Shobhit Gupta to solve Indian agriculture’s supply chain problems by designing and building an all-new state-of-the-art supply chain and digitising the farm-to-store network. It provides consumers with fresh and fully traceable food that is free of pesticides, and ensures farmers get a better deal.

While it was launched in 2019, Superplum started operations in 2020 and currently employs 70 people. It has both online as well as offline distribution, and its products can be found at multiple retail chains, including Spar, Metro, Reliance Retail, Starbazaar, Future etc.

The startup claims to have a distribution network of more than 320 stores in Delhi-NCR and Bengaluru.

Over the last year, it has delivered more than 1,000 tonnes of fresh produce through the COVID-induced shutdowns. Its container systems have travelled more than 150,000 km. Going forward, it aims to penetrate deeper into India and eventually expand in international markets as well.

Tapping technology

Superplum claims to have created a modern alternative for how agriculture supply works in India. "This involves reimagining just about every piece of the agriculture value chain," it said in a statement.

It has created a solution called FresheratorTM, which transforms any truck into a refrigerated vehicle, to alleviate India’s acute shortage of refrigerated transport.

Superplum's technology platform, FreshManager TM ensures every fruit is traceable to the farm and consumers can even check lab test reports and product parameters.

"FreshManager is uniquely designed for Indian conditions and small farms. Besides this, Superplum has a modular farm infrastructure, including a fast-setup cold room for remote rural farms, analytics to assess regional supply/demand mismatches, and multi-channel city distribution, including getting neighbourhood fruit shops online," the company.